#1 Lessons – The
Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
Travel can be funny. Take this trip for example, we are
crazy American travelers who speak no French and yet we jump in and go anyway.
It definitely has led to some funny situations and some really cool ones as well.
This trip has also led to more than a few lessons and I’m not talking about
language lessons.
Todd and I are slow learners – every time we travel to
faraway places involving serious jet lag, we continue to do the same thing-
arrive and go sightseeing. It always leads to ridiculous arguments and
silliness. We really need to time these trips so that we land at bedtime in the
country, seriously!
Anyway, back to our silliness, we arrived in Paris went to
the hotel and grabbed a quick shower. There is something about being on a plane
than just makes one feel icky and in dire need of a shower. We hopped on the
train into the city, and enjoyed a 40 min trip with few stops. Upon our
arrival, we found that we were at Notre Dame. We decided to grab some food at a
café overlooking the amazing sight that is Notre Dame.
The waiter served us the craziest drink—tea with limonade .
Now at home we drink Arnold Palmer’s all the time and love them. But this was
different; it was peach tea and sprite. They call sprite limonade. It was
delivered with a giant sparkler thing sticking out of it. All that for $12 Euro!!!! (per drink) Feeling
very much like a sucker at that point.
But hey, isn’t that what traveling is all about – experiencing new
things and learning lessons (over and over again).
The sparkler went out before I could get the pic.
Things got ugly; jet lag took over, and let’s just say, it
wasn’t pretty. I don’t know about the rest of you, but when I’m tired I get
ornery and ill behaved. It is very similar to when I go too long without eating
(see any of the recent Snickers commercials – I become quite beastly). Like a
toddler without a nap, I whine. In any case, it’s not my best side. My hubby
isn’t as bad but his patience runs thin and he gets snarky. Not a great combination in fact, things get
quite combustible as his patience goes away and my whininess increases
commensurate with my exhaustion.
In this case, I ended up lost and wandering about for a few
hours before finding my way back to the hotel. I have no directional sense so
that’s quite a feat—I did get off at the wrong stop but found my way back
thanks to some kindly French folks who helped me determine that I was indeed getting
on the right train.
Todd walked in a few minutes later, and we had a good chat,
ate an appetizer with a nice refreshing beer and went to bed. All was right in
our world once we went to bed—we slept a glorious 11 hours. What a rejuvenation
that was for the two of us!
I am thinking we need to stagger our arrival in a new place
or plan our trip so that we get there at bedtime. Isn’t the definition of crazy
that we continue to do the same thing expecting a different result? In that
case, we are CRAZY!
The new day took us straight to the depot to pick up the RV.
We got it at 9AM and hit the road. Now I’m heading out to hike up to the top of
Col de Peyresourde for Stage 9 of the Tour de France! Todd’s going to meet me at the top later;
he’s on his bike – getting one of his bucket list items checked off in a big way. It has been fun seeing his excitement. He’s
like a little kid on the night before Christmas.
More later!
Au revoir
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